The Agent of your dreams is here, ready to turn them into nightmares. Patch 4.08 introduces the next Initiator Agent, Fade, to the roster, you get new tiers of exclusives in the Battlepass, and access to a skinline that pops.
You know about Jett, and now it’s time to learn about mix ups with Sova and Neon that should round out the last few months of impactful Agent balance. Competitive 5-stacks also get some love.
AGENT UPDATES
FADE GOES LIVE
- See her abilities on our Agents page.
- See Fade’s debut trailer. You’ll wake up screaming.
JETT
The team loves what Jett has continually brought to the fight, but as the game has evolved, some of her impacts have pushed beyond what Riot think is healthy for the tactical promise of VALORANT. Their update to Tailwind aims to address these concerns while maintaining the aggressive site takes an awe-inspiring highlight plays Jett should bring to the roster. Check out their full article on the Jett update here for a complete breakdown of our approach and the philosophies that drove this update. Riot expects this change to have ripple effects on the Agents around Jett and the ecosystem overall, so they will keep a close eye not only on Jett but on any cascading impacts on the entire roster.
Tailwind
- Upon pressing E, Jett consumes her Tailwind charge and after a .75 second delay, activates a 12-second window where she’s able to dash on the next keypress
- Jett’s Tailwind charge can still be regained with 2 kills
- To keep parity with the changes to Jett dash, the functionality for Dash during Knife rounds in Escalation will be adjusted
NEON
Riot has been keeping an eye on Neon and wanted to make some quality of life changes to help remove some friction when playing as, or with, Neon.
General
- Battery energy received upon killing an enemy increased 25%>>>100%
High Gear
Riot has noticed Neon has faced some friction when using movement to lead into combat, specifically failed inputs due to the velocity restriction. We hope these changes help with making her slide a lot more natural when engaging in fights.
- Slide cannot be cast during equip delay
- Velocity restriction removed
- Neon can now slide sideways and forward, and only requires that she is moving
- Energy drain increased 6.7/s>>>10/s
Fast Lane
- Wall damage removed
- This change is intended to push Fast Lane into a more attractive option for Neon, or for an ally by preventing the disruptive portion of doing incidental damage.
SOVA
At high-level ranked or pro play, Sova’s been a staple for quite some time. While his power has not been felt as viscerally as Jett’s, his impact in coordinated settings is nearly unmatched. Riot wanted to focus on addressing the amount of space that the Owl Drone practically guaranteed, and introduce additional counterplay opportunities for opponents. A reduced Drone duration means Sova has to incur more risk in his positioning to clear deeper angles, and the adjustments to ping reveal (below) give opponents more opportunity to mix up their repositioning without feeling forced to completely exit the area. Shock Dart has also taken a hit as we continue to sharpen damage outputs on non-ultimate abilities so that they kill less frequently.
Owl Drone
- Duration reduced 10s >>> 7s
- Health reduced 125 >>> 100
Dart Reveal
- The number of reveal pings was reduced by 3 >>> 2
- Initial delay before first ping reveals increased 1.2s >>> 1.6s*
- *Delay between the first and second ping remains 1.2s
Quality of Life
- Changed crosshair colour to green to better stand out against the white HUD
- Removed delay on [Target Hit] confirmation text
- [Target Hit] confirmation text now remains on the player HUD when transitioning out of Owl Drone.
- [Target Hit] confirmation text now remains on screen for 2s, previously 1s
- Adjusted audio on drone dart hits for both Sova, and the player hit, to make confirmations more noticeable
- Fixed a bug with Owl Drone, where the Dart Cooldown UI element would not properly update after tagging an opponent.
Shock Dart
- Max Damage decreased 90 >>> 75
- Radial damage has been scaled in accordance with the new max damage.
AGENT ABILITY AMMO
- Jett’s Bladestorm, Raze’s Showstopper, and Sova’s Hunter’s Fury will now show how much ammo they have left when equipped
COMPETITIVE UPDATES
5-Stack Queues
- Reduced Rank Rating gain/loss penalty for different 5-stack configurations
- If EVERYONE in your party is Iron–Diamond 2:
- No RR penalty if within normal grouping
- 25% RR penalty for all players if any player falls outside of normal grouping
- If ANYONE in your party is Diamond 3–Immortal 3 (but no one in your party is Radiant)
- 25% RR penalty for all players
- If ANYONE in your party is Radiant
- 75% RR penalty for all players
- Tuned matchmaking to reduce wait time for 5-stacks
You can read the basics on how Rank Rating penalties work for 5-stacks in their previous patch notes.
BUGS
Agents
- Fixed a bug where Jett could find herself unable to use abilities or weapons when using Tailwind immediately after depleting her Bladestorm daggers
- Fixed a bug where Yoru could teleport out of bounds when using Gatecrash
- Fixed various exploits allowing Yoru to use weapons before fully decloaking at the end of his ultimate
Performance
- Fixed a bug in the Shooting Range where bots would respawn unarmed
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